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Cardin wants independent commission to probe Flynn, Russia contacts

The leading Democrat on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee is reiterating his call for an independent commission to investigate Russia’s election interference, saying that the body should also probe contact between Trump administration officials and Russia.

In his resignation letter, Flynn disclosed that he had given “incomplete information” to Pence and others about his telephone calls with the ambassador. The FBI has been looking into Flynn’s contact with the Russian official.

“It’s not so much about what he did or didn’t do, it’s why these connections were being made and what was Russia’s motivation. It’s not so much Mr. Flynn’s motivations, but Russia’s motivations,” Cardin said Tuesday morning. “I am not anxious to hold him accountable for misleading the vice president. That doesn’t concern me as much as to why the Russian ambassador was doing what he was doing.”

Cardin and four other Democratic senators introduced legislation in early January to create an independent, nonpartisan commission with full-time staff to investigate Russian interference in the presidential election, similar to the body set up following the September 11 terrorist attacks.

Cardin said Tuesday that the proposed commission should also look into “whether there has been any other effort to compromise any of our key people” beyond the contact between Flynn and the Russian ambassador.

“We know Russia does that freely of business leaders. Have they done that with anyone else?” the senator added.

Cardin indicated that he believes the bill establishing the commission would have broad support, but said Republicans would need to put pressure on leadership to put it to a floor vote.